At the northwest corner of Pendleton Avenue and County Road 600 South, 21 acres of farm field are zoned for houses. When Lone Pine II brought the plan to the Pendleton Plan Commission on January 7, it showed 42 preliminary lots at about two per acre, roughly 8 1/2 acres of common area, a 30-foot buffer along the existing tree line, and homes priced from $375,000 to $500,000. The Town Council approved the rezone on February 12.
A neighbor at the hearing asked a practical question: do the homes have to pay impact fees, and if so, how much? Plan Commission president Tim Pritchard said about $21,000 per home, counting system development, electric and water.
Buyers comparing new construction in Pendleton seldom see that figure, but it is in every new-build price. The largest piece is about to be recalculated. A public hearing is set for December 2, and the Town Council takes it up on December 10.
The bill that comes with each new lot
The town's posted fee schedule lists the charges a new single-family home runs into before it gets utility service.
| Charge on the town schedule | Listed amount |
|---|---|
| Road impact fee, single-family residence | $10,184.33 |
| Park impact fee, detached single-family home | $3,854.00 |
| Water capacity fee | $2,000 |
| Water connection or tap fee | starting at $3,000, priced by line size |
| Electric system development fee, developments of four or more lots | $2,000 |
| Water system development fee, developments of four or more lots | $1,600 |
| Electric service connection | $500 |
At the lowest tap price, those lines add up to a little more than $23,000. The president's estimate of about $21,000 is in the same range. Electric install fees are calculated separately for each project, so the exact total depends on the development.
The road fee is the biggest single line, and it doesn't stand still. The schedule says it carries a 5% inflation factor applied every January 1 under Ordinance 21-15. If nothing else changed, the next increase would put it at about $10,693.55 in 2027.
Compare that with the new homes for sale in town. Arbor Homes advertises Maplewood at Huntzinger Farm from the $260,000s. D.R. Horton lists homes at Baker's Pointe from $339,900 to $549,900. On a house in the $260,000s, $21,000 in town fees is roughly 8% of the price. The builder pays those fees no matter how the market is doing, so they work like a floor under every new-construction price in town.
The rewrite going to a hearing in December
On October 9, the town posted a draft 2026 Road Impact Fee Zone Improvement Plan prepared by A&F Engineering. It set a Plan Commission hearing for December 2, 2026, with Town Council consideration tentatively set for December 10. An earlier notice had set October dates. A revised notice dated October 15 moved them to December.
The proposal drops the flat per-house figure and charges by traffic instead. The revised hearing notice puts it this way:
"The road impact fee will be calculated by multiplying the Number of Trips by the road impact fee per 24-hour trip rate established by the Town based on consultation with A&F Engineering, which in the first year following the effective date of the Ordinance will be $337.76."
The draft report works the rate out to $337.36, 40 cents lower than the notice. These are the inputs the draft plan uses for its rate. The draft's own subtotals and rounding differ slightly from simple arithmetic on these figures, so the exact cents will come from the final version:
- Estimate what it would cost to bring the town's study intersections and roads up to standard for 10 years of growth: $22,031,140.
- Subtract what it would cost to fix problems that already exist with today's traffic: $9,350,000. The draft cites the principle that new development can't be charged for existing deficiencies.
- Add the $161,000 cost of the study, then subtract $879,474.22 in road impact fees already collected this year.
- Divide by the daily weekday trips expected from vacant parcels the town thinks could develop over the next 10 years, about 35,400.
The draft also shows example charges. For 10 detached single-family homes, its table lists 91 daily trips and a road impact fee of $30,699.45. Divided evenly, that is about $3,070 per house. The current schedule lists $10,184.33.
The posted notice and draft don't say how the per-trip charge will sit alongside the existing flat fee, and the final rate can still change at the hearing. For a buyer, the facts to hold onto are the dates and the method. Future increases also work differently. The draft says the per-trip rate may rise each year by no more than the combined change in the Consumer Price Index over the preceding five years, where the current fee grows by a fixed 5% each January.
Where the trips, and the road money, come from
A per-trip formula spreads road costs according to who generates the traffic, so the list of expected development matters. The draft's vacant-parcel table includes several single-family tracts, with 42 homes on one of them. It also includes general retail, offices, light industrial, multifamily buildings, two gas stations and a 192-room hotel.
The commercial side is already in front of the town. In June, the Plan Commission reviewed the Heritage Hub plan, which proposes a 97-room Fairfield by Marriott, a 95-room TownePlace Suites, retail, medical offices and a restaurant, financed through a TIF process. On September 9, the commission recommended a 10.05-acre rezone for a proposed Kroger of about 75,000 square feet on North Heritage Way. The rezone appeared on the October 8 Town Council agenda as Ordinance 26-16.
The improvement list follows those same corridors. It includes new and extended segments of Heritage Way, an intersection at SR 38 and Heritage Way, work at Water Street and SR 67 and at Pendleton Avenue and SR 67, and $600,000 for CR 600 South at Pendleton Avenue. That last one is the intersection next to the Hite Farms site. The draft splits some intersection costs 50/50 with INDOT and the proposed Heritage Way segments 50/50 with development. At the February hearing, town staff said CR 600 South was on the priority list and that the impact fee study would likely identify it as a needed improvement.
Why the county median doesn't price a Pendleton home
Fees matter more here because Pendleton's market is so different from the rest of Madison County. The Indiana Association of Realtors reports a Madison County median sale price of $215,950 for September 2026, up 20% from a year earlier, on 137 closed sales. MIBOR's count for the same month, reported by the Indianapolis Business Journal via the Daily Journal, was $218,450 on 128 sales, up 27%.
In ZIP 46064, the IAR dashboard shows a September 2026 median of $350,000 on 28 sales. In other words, the county median is about $134,000 below the median for Pendleton's own ZIP code.
Resale buyers in Pendleton also have more choice this fall. September inventory in 46064 was up 81% from a year earlier, new listings were up 67%, and the ratio of sale price to list price fell 4.2 points. The IAR weekly snapshot for the week of October 5 shows two things at once. Half of listings went under contract within 10 days, and 51.8% of active listings had a price cut. Homes sold at 95.7% of their original asking price.
That gives a buyer comparing a new home with a resale a concrete question to ask. A resale seller can cut the price when the market softens. A builder's cost includes about $21,000 in town charges that stay the same in any market. The largest of those charges gets recalculated this December, on a formula that ties road costs to traffic.
FAQ
Do these fees apply if I buy an existing Pendleton home? The schedule says the road and park impact fees apply to new construction or a significant change in use. They do not apply to a raze-and-replace. A resale buyer isn't paying them again.
When would a new road fee take effect? The Plan Commission hearing is December 2, 2026, and the Town Council takes it up tentatively on December 10. The notice says the $337.76 rate applies in the first year after the ordinance's effective date. The posted notice doesn't give that effective date.
Can residents comment? Yes. The notice says all interested parties may appear and be heard at the December 2 hearing at Town Hall, 100 West State Street. Written objections filed with the Plan Commission at or before the hearing will also be heard.
This post is general information, not legal, tax or financial advice. If a fee affects your purchase, confirm the current numbers with the town and your own builder, attorney or lender.
If you're weighing a new build in Baker's Pointe, Huntzinger Farm or one of the tracts coming next against a resale across town, The McKown Team can go through the numbers with you line by line. We'll show you what's built into the price and how this fall's resale market compares. Contact us before the December vote and we'll go through the current fee schedule with you.
